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"It's in the interest of buyers to have low COVs, but it's in the interest of sellers who own the flats to have high COVs… So, between these two groups, we must let them fight it out… The Government prefers not to interfere.”
Mah Bow Tan, Today, 26 July 2010
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Read also:
Siew Kum Hong:
The "market" as deus ex machina (or, The Scapegoat For Rising Housing Prices and Other Inconvenient Realities)
""Leave it to the market" is a rationale that is often trotted out, to justify why the Government should not intervene in something or other, be it rising housing prices or rising COE prices. But government policy can have a huge impact on prices (and sentiment, which can drive prices in markets like property), as implicitly acknowledged by Mr Mah when he talked about ramping up supply as a way to moderate price increases."
Mr Wang:
The Little Story of One HDB Flat
"The Singapore government can tell you lots of stories about how PRs form only a small percentage of HDB resale buyers; that the PRs are not the cause of HDB prices shooting up etc. These are mostly self-serving stories, designed to make Mah Bow Tan look less incompetent and to ward off criticisms of Singapore's foreign talent policy.
If you have your nose on the ground, you know better."
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Cartoon by Joshua Chiang.